Josef Albers on Experience

The best education is one’s own experience. Experimenting surpasses studying. To start out by ‘playing’ develops courage, leads in a natural manner to an inventive way of building and furthers the pedagogically equally important facility of discovery. Inventiveness is the objective. Invention, and re-invention too, is the essence of all creative work (proficiency is a tool and hence is secondary). Instruction in professional techniques hampers inventiveness.

Josef Albers, founding member of Bauhaus philosophy and school of architecture, Berlin.